


Another Path

by Shadaras



Series: Drabbles [9]
Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: 5+1 Things, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drabble Sequence, Everybody Lives, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:13:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23247568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadaras/pseuds/Shadaras
Summary: Qui-Gon bargains for not just Anakin's freedom but Shmi's as well, and the galaxy is set upon a different road.
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Shmi Skywalker, Qui-Gon Jinn & Shmi Skywalker
Series: Drabbles [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1835029
Comments: 7
Kudos: 47
Collections: All The Nice Things Flash Exchange 2020





	Another Path

**Author's Note:**

  * For [revanchxst (BadWolfGirl01)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BadWolfGirl01/gifts).



1.  
Anakin blazes past the finish line, and Shmi finally lets herself cry.

Everyone’s cheering, and on the holoscreen Shmi can see Anakin’s radiant joy; he’d always known he could do this, given a chance. She’d believed in him, as best she could, but it had been so hard, such a contrast to the rest of the world.

The Jedi places a hand on her shoulder and she looks up at him. “You’ll both be coming with us,” he says, quiet in the midst of the chaos. “We’ll help you make a new home.”

Shmi smiles, and allows herself to hope.

2.  
The spaceship is big, and cold, and Shmi doesn’t know what to do with herself. She’s made a living cooking, scavenging, and repairing anything she could get her hands on, and supplemented that doing childcare. The children here (because the Queen and her handmaids are children, still, for all their authority) are not hers, save for Anakin, and Anakin’s spending every breath he can trailing after the Jedi with starry eyes.

Shmi contents herself with watching, wary, wanting to know more about the man titled _Master_ who set them free. He could be good, she thinks, if given a chance.

3.  
“I will train him,” Qui-Gon Jinn says, as if that settles the whole matter.

Shmi looks at him, across the guest chamber’s little table, and does not blink. “Can you make that promise?” she asks, thinking of all the broken promises that lead to slavery. “You call yourself _Master_ , yet you answer to a higher power. What do _they_ say?”

He looks away.

Shmi smiles tightly. “Do not make promises you cannot keep, Qui-Gon,” she says softly. “I want him to flourish, not be trapped by different chains.”

“There are other paths,” Qui-Gon says.

Her heart beats faster. “Tell me.”

4.  
Jedha, when they arrive there, is infinitely more familiar than Coruscant ever could be. The long desert sands are not the Dune Sea, but they still catch the evening light (one sun, not two) in the same way. The Guardians of the Whills, Shmi has learned, allow their initiates to keep their families and to love as they will. A kinder place, one Shmi thinks she can live within.

Anakin asks Obi-Wan a hundred questions as he pilots the rented speeder through crowded Jedhan streets, and Obi-Wan laughs, young again for a moment, and does his best to keep up.

5.  
The Jedhan Temple houses them both, and Shmi settles into its rhythms. They have plenty of work for her: Helping in the kitchens, caring for orphans left at the Temple’s steps, selling votives at the market. They offer to induct her as an initiate herself, but they never press once she first declines the offer.

Anakin thrives, laughing easily, playing with the other children of the Temple and the city, and getting into trouble—just as he always has. Slowly, year by year, Shmi’s heart and body relax, softening into the Temple rituals and the gentle life they now live.

+1.  
Anakin is a full-fledged Guardian of the Whills now, and Shmi sits down to have tea with Qui-Gon, who has always visited when he could.

“He’s grown into a remarkable man,” Qui-Gon says, sipping the rich Jedhan tea.

“Yes.” Shmi studies Qui-Gon, thinking of other possibilities. “I’m glad you brought us here.”

Qui-Gon laughs. “I’m glad I wasn’t too proud to back down.”

“You said something about him being the Chosen One, once.”

“Yes.” Qui-Gon looks across the courtyard at Anakin. “I think I wanted that to be true.”

“He’s happy here.”

“And you?”

“Yes.” Shmi smiles. “I am too.”


End file.
